mmp2's Blog

Deadliest Warrior

mmp2 — Wed, 13 May 2009 06:27:04 +0000

I recently came across a show called Deadliest Warrior on Spike TV, while flipping through channels. I looked into the show on the internet and learned that it is about bringing feared warriors together, spanning time periods and geography. Analysts discuss the skills and tactics that made such warriors successful in their time and pace and at the end of the show there is a showdown between the two characters. Such showdowns have included characters such as: Pirate vs. Knight, Taliban vs. IRA, Yakuza vs. Mafia, Viking vs. Samurai, Green Beret vs. Spetznaz, Maori vs. Shaolin Monks, William Wallace vs. Shaka Zulu and Ninja vs. Spartan. When I saw the show I only caught the end of the show, or the showdown which happened to be between the Greem Beret and Spetznaz. While I watched two men battle out the showdown I felt like I was watching a reenactment of a Call of Duty Game. The men ran through abandoned buildings in full garb, stalking one another waiting to make the move. Without knowing what the point was I was sure that I was watching men simulate a game such as Call of Duty, which is a simulation of war events. Even knowing what the show is supposed to be about I still feel like it is a simulation of a game; creating showdowns between characters of ones choosing to see who will win in the battle royal. I can’t help but to think what it means when shows start to take on characteristics of video games; are we more interested in or comfortable with shows that look like video games? Is it simply that we can relate better to programming that makes life look like something out of a video game? And if so what does this say about us as a culture? That we have come to value simulations of life so much that we simulate life through the simulation of a video game…

Born in the Wrong Generation

mmp2 — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 06:08:02 +0000

The Verizon Hub is the home phone “reinvented” or so says the verizon website. The Hub is a home phone that allows one to watch video, search and buy movie tickets, message others on their cell phones via texts, check local traffic, monitor where other family members are, store contacts, provide a calendar, with a touch screen that doubles as a digital picture frame. And did I mention you could make phone calls on it too? The Hub, like the name, implies is really the all in one home device that takes the place of a home phone, cell phone, computer, calendar, and even picture frames. Even though it does sound pretty cool to me I am drawn to think about how well it will go over. I live in a house with two other girls and although we have a home phone I must admit that I don’t even know the phone number. I have only used it to call my own cell phone when I can’t find it in the house. And in terms of incoming calls I never answer the occasional call because I know it is a sales call because no one I know has the number. Besides asking myself why I even have a home phone I find myself asking who would use this new Hub? I know my parents would not be interested in it because lets face it their generation isn’t the most savvy when it comes to electronic devices. If my mom is just now mastering how to send me text messages from her phone how long will it take for her to learn how to do it on a digital picture frame/movie ticket buyer/ traffic checker on her kitchen counter? So although it looks so nice, I am sure its uses would be lost on them. So it seems to me that Verizon has come up with a really cool looking home phone with no one to use it: people my parent’s age will not use because they don’t know how and will most likely not take the time to learn how, and people my age have no use for because the home phone is a thing of the past. Poor Hub, you were born at the wrong time.

The Status of Being Social

mmp2 — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 07:08:26 +0000

My Mom rides BART to and from work every day. I am used to hearing her complain about aspects of public transportation like how crowded trains can get. I have noticed that her complaints have begun to take on another tone, a tone that is one dictated by the antisocial tendencies that technological devices have lead to. Instead of newspapers people have phones with internet capabilities, instead of books people watch movies on laptops and phones, people have ipods in their ears, phones in their hands, and little social interaction with those around them, mostly because they are not focused on where they are. I know, as does my Mom, that people don’t want to have to make small talk with people on public transportation, but has technology led to an antisocial sentiment in the arena of public transportation? Have people come to escape their environment so easily that they now have little interest in the individuals that are actually in their environment? Is something lost when people don’t look up from their phones, laptops, and ipods to acknowledge your presence, meet the glance of someone trying to negotiate if a seat is open, or even just offer a passing smile? Is technology changing the climate of BART and other public transportation?

The New Past

mmp2 — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 06:49:08 +0000

I recently saw part of an episode of a show called Time Warp. I watched as the crew attempted to recreate the explosion caused by a failed rocket launch that took place during World War II. As I viewed the recreation of a rocket from the past, as well as an explosion captured on a high speed camera, I began to contemplate the name of this show. I first thought that the name represented the time warp that occurs when high speed cameras are used to record images at rates that allow for extreme slow motion viewing. In this sense time warp just represents the slowing down of time to view a particular event in more detail. The more I thought about the significance of the recreation of the rocket so as to view the event in slow motion I began to see another aspect that the name time warp represents, namely the viewing of past events through new technology. In this sense the time warp is not merely about events in slow motion but rather events from the past being viewed through a present lens. By recreating the rocket explosion one is able to see something from the past through present technology; technology that was the distant future at the time of the actual event. It seems then that the time warp is a way to view the past in a new way, to reopen the past to be explored in the present world, and to give life to the past through present technologies. I could be way off with all of this but I found it rather interesting and I was compelled by the idea of seeing how the past looks through our current technological eyes.

Technological Lashes

mmp2 — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 05:35:00 +0000

I guess it was only a matter of time before technology made its way into the make-up industry. After all women are always looking to improve upon their appearance, and advertising companies are always looking for new and better ways to sell products to people. I don’t think that those two things happen in that order though. In fact I believe that many of the products women use are products that they have come to buy because advertising has done what its job aims at, namely to sell people products they don’t need, but that they come to see as a need. Make-up is surely one such area for women, where they come to view beauty products as a need. So what is the impact of technology making its way into the beauty industry? Take for example Lancôme’s mascara that features a vibrating brush. The implication of such a brush is the fullest most beautiful lashes ever imagined, no longer as a figment of the imagination, but rather as a reality. I think that advertising within the beauty industry already makes women feel so deficient about their looks and somehow the addition of technology just intensifies such feelings. In one sense I guess it is just bringing the beauty industry up to date with other industries that are changing with every new technological advance. In another sense this new mascara can be seen as an economically solution for women who can’t afford eyelash extensions. Yes, that is correct, real hair that is added to the tips of eyelashes as extensions. Sort of like fake lashes but on a semi permanent basis. But what happened to just plain old mascara, or just plain natural lashes for that matter? I guess fake lashes have been around for a long time, but really a vibrating mascara brush…. Does technology in this industry just make women feel more inadequate with their looks? Does the incorporation of technology into the beauty industry produce a culture that comes to value unrealistic beauty expectations? After all technology has redefined the limits of other aspects of life and what is to say it won’t do the same for beauty standards?

Guest Speaker, The Second Coming

mmp2 — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 05:11:10 +0000

While our first guest speaker discussed new and contemporary forms and functions of media, our latest guest speaker talked more about older forms of media such as newspapers. When I think about this distinction between new and old media I begin to think about how I feel more comfortable talking about new media because I feel that I have grown up with social networking, texting, fast paced, digital media. For many, though, old media still feel more familiar. I guess, there seems to exist a sort of paradox for me between the names of these media and the familiarity which I assign to them. For something old usually seems more familiar than something new. With this though, I stray from the point. The point here being the role of ethics that our speaker addressed with her story about Bud Dwyer. The point made was that just because we can see something does that mean we should? With phenomena such as You Tube very few things are kept censored for long. When something doesn’t show up on the news one can usually find it, or a full form of it, on You Tube. Ethics, in a way, can be continually snuffed out by new media such as You Tube that do not have strict censoring regulations. I guess this too is a paradox for me because I find that older media such as traditional news broadcasts and newspaper outlets often censor things so much that dissent is also censored. While I understand that news is supposed to offer information so as to inform citizens who can choose to either agree are disagree with the current state of affairs, I also know that newspapers and broadcasts censor the information so as to hinder citizens from truly being informed in the democratic process. Where, I ask, is the ethics in this? For, I view dissent as integral to the democratic process. The question then becomes what role does You Tube play in dissent? For I believe that questions of ethics must revolve around questions of how important information is to our democracy and our informed voter base. In the case of Bud Dwyer one would first have to assess his action as a political statement and the profoundness of its impact on a voting citizenry before being able to accurately discern the roles of ethics in censorship. As you can see the lecture was rather thought provoking.

The Demands of Flow

mmp2 — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 08:08:58 +0000

I have been noticing lately that there are a lot of people that I know who can’t seem to sit in silence. They have to either be listening to an ipod, or talking on their phone, or watching TV. In fact I know in my own house my roommates have to have music or the TV on in the background of almost every activity that they do, whether it be cooking, or reading, doing homework, or even falling asleep. The more I think about this occurrence the more I think about flow and the possibility that flow has shaped people into individuals who can not be without some sort of visual or auditory stimulus. It makes sense to me that if one grows up watching TV or even listening to the radio, that one would grow accustomed to always having some sort of noise that is always changing; whether in content or character. Has flow then shaped the current generation into a generation that demands constant noise, and rapid imagery as a background to life?

The Snapshot

mmp2 — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 07:57:28 +0000

This picture was taken of a boy in Brazil who is taking his first pictures with a digital camera. In fact he was one of many children that we worked with while in Brazil thatwere fascinated by snapping pictures of everything and anything. I was recalled while reading Arjun Appadurai’s piece to this picture because in some sense I think that this little boy imagined a world while holding this digital camera. He saw us as a group of Americans and was curious about where and how we lived. The digital camera to him and others was a representation of life in the U.S. As Appadurai contends the farther one is from the direct experiences of a certain type of life the more likely one is to imagine worlds that are fantasized in nature. I think that our digital cameras in the context of this neighborhood in Brazil, to these children, were technologies that sparked an imaginary, fantasized view of life in the U.S.

How Nike Gets You To Just Do It

mmp2 — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 07:05:09 +0000

Today in one of my other classes we talked about advertisements in the media. Particularly we talked about Nike advertisements and how they portray stereotypes of ethnicities and cultural identities. This is to say that these types of advertisements shape the cultural identities that individuals come to understand themselves through. Nike has taken the stance that advertising to African American individuals is best accomplished through appeals to sports. Nike then asserts that African American individuals are drawn to sports and therefore that sports are a cultural appeal, or part of cultural identity. Nike seems then to be basing advertising and marketing off of stereotypes that exist in our society. I see this as important to our class because it discusses the way that identity can be shaped by media such as advertisements found on TV and in magazines. Furthermore, this also shows how stereotypes are continually reinforced through the things we see everyday, yet we may not even be cognoscente of such stereotypes. It seems to be a bit of a cycle that occurs then: advertisers feed off of social stereotypes to draw a certain target audience, but at the same time the stereotypes are being reinforced back into society through the advertisements that they are used in.

Poker Run in the Bay Area

mmp2 — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 19:47:53 +0000

Yes, I know it sounds strange but a poker run is a way to play a game of poker while driving your car. The first weekend in April there will be a Poker run in the bay area as a memorial for a friend and a car enthusiast who passed away a few months ago. During a poker run a group of people organizes a scavenger hunt of sorts, but with a twist, namely that you are playing a game of cards while finding your way along a predetermined route. To start of this game the group assembles in a spot and receives a clue about the next stop on the route. At that first stop the participants receive one card from a deck of cards. At each stop along the route the participants pick up a new clue about the next stop and also another card from the deck of cards. At the end of the route participants compile their cards and whoever has the best hand has won the game of poker. Winning, however, not only requires one to have a good hand of cards, but also to be able to decode clues well enough to make it along the route in a time and manner that benefits them.
This event reminded me of the spatial annotation and location based games that we learned about in class. This sort of event turns what would normally be a gams that one plays sitting around a table, into something that brings people out to new places in the company of those that support a similar cause. Also of importance is that one may be taken to new places of familiar cities and neighborhoods because they are following a route that someone else has created. For example, in next weekends poker run the route could be comprised of places that were of significance or favorites of the individual that the event is being organized to memorialize. This then would be a way to get people to see the city and area through his eyes. It brings a new way of looking at old places, and a way to play a game in a new surrounding. Plus, one can not overlook the fact that this game could not be possible without the automobile!